The Purge Review

The book, Honor and the American Dream: Culture and Identity in a Chicano Community, and the film, Salt of the Earth, both relay to their audience, the pursuit of happiness within the Chicano community in which they live. These works aim to show how Mexican-American immigrants fight to keep both their honor and value systems alive in the United States of America, a country which is foreign to their traditions. The Mexican-Americans encountered in these works fight for their culture of honor in order to define themselves in their new homeland, a homeland which honors the American dream of successful capitalism.

In The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and And Then There Were None, they are many similarities displayed about human nature. Both stories share motifs of being trapped. They also prove that humans can be very savage and very sadistic.

Torture, murder, oppression; these despicable acts are prime tenets in the governments of 1984, by George Orwell, and 2081, by Kurt Vonnegut. Inhuman acts are commonplace in many fictional worlds, but these two works showcase characters losing their humanity and being subjected to terrible acts. In both 1984 and 2081, dehumanization and inhumane acts are expressed through the removal of free expression and physical violence designed to break deviants.

August 4, 2026, in Allendale, California, everything is made easy for the family who occupy a technologically advanced home that caters to their every need. Every morning breakfast is made, the date is announced, information is given on friends and bills that need to be paid. Little mice clean and do the chores around the house. This all changed on August 4th when the house becomes eerily quiet, with no family insight. The family is gone but silhouettes of a man, woman and two small children are painted alongside the house. A nuclear explosion wipes out the city, the town is desolate with just rubble and ashes left behind. A fire erupts and the

Notably, the film Goodfellas is a classic film that is recognized as one of the greatest films of all time in regards to the crime genre. Indeed, the film Goodfellas is about American citizens who partake in criminal activity in order to make money. Furthermore, another film was made, shortly after Goodfellas achieved great success in the box office. Additionally, another film titled “The Real Goodfella” is the uncensored documentary explaining the reality behind Goodfellas, and gives a practical insight of the real dangers that could not be shown in Goodfellas. Also there are two articles that explain the explicit truth behind the criminal activity that mobsters justify as work. These sources show that mobsters have a hard time. Mobsters classify as above working class because they constantly have to steal, murder, and deal drugs just to stay alive and have money.

people, and expunging the freedom that people have come to accept as normal, or what they

Another event that led to the Rampart scandal was in November 6, 1997 when $722,000 was stolen from a Bank of America in Los Angeles. Later the bank manager confessed that her boyfriend, a LAPD officer, played a major role and planned the robbery. The officer was taken to prison for 14 years.

Eugene Robinson and Justin Wolfers two articles are useful in letting us see Carter’s situation. Robinson’s article “Disintegration” is contributing to us seeing how hard Carter’s life was by blacks being disintegrated outside the prison. We all may assume that disintegration or segregation happens only outside prison. Yet, as explained in Paumgarten’s article that segregation occurs in prison too, especially on blacks. If black prisoners run into trouble, they are put into segregation for weeks. Robinson’s article “Disintegration” explains how blacks are split into four different groups. It writes “These four black America are increasingly distinct, separated by demography, geography, and psychology. They have different profiles, different

Conflict theory says that crime and deviance is a result of economic inequalities. If the families in the movie had money, they would have no desire to be deviant and commit robbery.

Another element of the gangster genre that is seen in Wellman’s film is the rise and fall trajectory of the central gangster protagonist. In order to avoid glamorizing the life of a gangster and his perverted American Dream, his crimes must be punished. This is a central element to any gangster film created under the auspices of the production code. To obey the rules and regulation of the PCA, any gangster in film will live “a short but glamorous life..that reaffirms the audience’s knowledge that in Hollywood, lawlessness cannot go unpunished” (Køhlert 857). The era under the PCA shaped the narrative of the gangster genre to include the death of essentially every gangster protagonist. In one of the most powerful scenes of the film, after Tom has taken revenge on the rival members, he stumbles, shot, clutching his chest into the raining streets and gutter (The Public Enemy). He is alone, isolated by the rain, and likely going to die. This is not a character the audience is supposed to sympathize with, and this is exactly to goal of the gangster genre. After the audience has seen Powers rise through the world of crime starting as a little boy

Films throughout American history have focused on such a wide array of topics – a lot of them having to do with the time period in which they were produced. Some of these topics appear all throughout the history of film, one of them being crime. No matter where you go or where you look, whether it be in a certain place or a certain time period, you can’t escape crime; it’s always there – which is why I think crime is such a popular topic in American films. One of the most popular crime films in America is Bonnie and Clyde – a 1967 film, set during the Great Depression, about a woman who leaves home with a man whom she just met and soon falls in love with to rob banks. However, this movie has a bit of a twist: Bonnie and Clyde, the criminal couple, are portrayed throughout the movie as heroes – the audience is actually sort of invited to root for them to not get caught by the laws and to escape. This unusual crime film illustrates a liberal perspective by portraying Bonnie and Clyde, the criminals, as the heroes and the cops, as well as the banks, as the antagonists. The uniqueness of this film kind of shows how America in the 1960s felt about crime and how the cops and the banks are a part of a failing system in society at the time.

The Purge directed by James DeMonaco can be considered a commentary on our socio political existence.To begin, the violence and crime is expressed and filled with allegories of America’s corrupt politics if you say. In addition, rigged economic systems is portrayed when the poor is oppressed by the rich due to no access to weapons and top notch security systems. The Purge isn't your average celebrated festival in America like Mardi Gras, Carnival, or even Halloween. However, they all have the same set-up such as designated times where people can violate social norms. As said in the movie by the antagonist, “the purge is halloween for the adults”. Although it may seem like The Purge is an event to undermine the control that law and

A clear indication that the purges were motivated by forcing internal cohesion is that the majority of the repression is directed towards marginal social groups, as disorder created a threat to the regime. Shearer argues this by saying “most histories overlook this kind of repression, and yet Stalin and other soviet leaders regarded social order as one of the highest priorities of state security. They considered social disorder and the greatest threat to the regime and its policies.” (Shearer policing page 2)

Both of these works have very similar narrators. By just reading the works, they seem very different because of who they killed and why, where and with whom they lived, and how they murdered their victims. But, by analyzing the two men, they become more and more alike. They both tell their stories in the first person and write from their jail cells. Each chose to reference an animal in their stories. The two men, both hide the corpses in the structures of the homes. Likewise, the narrators try to defend their sanity by logically justifying their horrific actions based on their mental states throughout the flashbacks of the events.

The novel, Darkness at Noon, clearly references Stalin’s purges and the show trials that occurred during the late 1930s. Although not explicitly mentioned, it is clear that this is what the novel is truly about. By reading the book, one can gain a further understanding of the time period. The novel, Darkness at Noon, can contribute to a further understanding of the 30s in the Soviet Union through its themes of old vs. new and the use of historical fiction.